Explanation:
Is it dawn or false dawn?
During certain times of the year, the horizon near the
rising Sun will begin to glow unusually early.
This early glow does not originate directly from the Sun,
but rather from sunlight reflected by
interplanetary dust.
Called
zodiacal light,
the
glowing triangle of light may be mistaken, for a while, for a sunrise, and so may be called a false dawn.
Pictured above, two false dawns were recorded in time lapse movies each spanning about five hours from the perch of the
highest observatory in the world: Mount Saraswati near
Hanle,
India.
At its brightest, the rising
zodiacal triangle on the left glows brighter than even the central disk of our Milky Way Galaxy --
visible as the diagonal
band moving left to right across the frame.